Empty beer bottles were in the back seat with a passenger in a car. What is the law for empty containers in Iowa and do the empty bottles ap...

Question

Empty beer bottles were in the back seat with a passenger in a car. What is the law for empty containers in Iowa and do the empty bottles apply to the open container charge.

Answer

In Iowa the open container law addresses itself to "containing an alcoholic beverage.". I do not think empties would have any effect on a pending open container charge except that the fact finder might infer that some drinking had been going on beforehand.